Time for posturing is over

Weeks of increasingly contentious debate over the looming debt ceiling deadline have deadlocked Congress and the White House. Congressional Republicans say unprecedented levels of federal spending must be reduced to move from this year’s $1.4 trillion deficit to a balanced federal budget. The president and congressional Democrats insist that higher taxes are needed to make current government spending levels permanent.

The House last week approved the Cut, Cap and Balance bill to make needed cuts in federal spending and lock in a balanced budget permanently. I strongly support and voted for this legislation when it came to the Senate. Unfortunately, the Senate’s Democrat majority voted it down — bolstered by President Barack Obama’s promise to veto the bill if it reached his desk.

The Gang of Six proposal lacks many important details that would need to be added for Congress to take action. But it outlines a combination of provisions that could be the basis for achieving the goal of a balanced budget: deep spending cuts, entitlement program reform and a pro-growth overhaul of the tax code. The plan’s tax provisions include lower individual income tax rates for all taxpayers and repealing the Alternative Minimum Tax, which would force taxes higher for 30 million people this year.

Balancing the federal budget and taming our $14.3 national debt are the crucial issues upon which hinge both the short and long-term fate of our economy. Uncertainty about job-killing taxes and the looming Obama health care reform, along with unsustainable federal deficits, are causing our businesses to delay hiring. Economic recovery and America’s future security and prosperity will ultimately be determined by our ability to focus and deliver on deficit reduction and pro-growth tax policies.

In addition to destabilizing financial markets, interest rates for all types of borrowing would rise, including mortgages, credit cards and new business borrowing for job creation. A U.S. default on its debt would, for the first time, call into question the stability of the U.S. dollar.

In addition to global financial disruption, prices for virtually all the goods we import — starting with the already high price of gasoline — could skyrocket. The interest rate on trillions of accumulated government debt would rise, too, making an already dire fiscal situation worse.

There is still time to avert these possible consequences and ensure our country’s long-range economic and national security. But there is no time to lose. Unless the debt ceiling crisis is resolved with a sound plan to cut spending and get to a balanced budget, serious problems will start sometime next month.

We can’t compromise on important principles. So it won’t be easy to reach agreement between the Democrats in control of the White House and the Senate and Republicans in control of the House.

The Gang of Six plan has offered major concepts that would both uphold our principles and break the deadlock. Elements of the Cut, Cap, and Balance plan should also be part of a solution.

But the time for posturing is over. We in Congress must roll up our sleeves and do the job we were elected to do: put our country’s financial affairs in order; keep the government’s hands out of our pocketbooks; and ensure economic opportunity for all Americans.